Todd Hensley

In just one year, with construction occurring only between performance seasons, this 1926 opera house received a renovation and expansion that reached from its 3‑story lobby skylight down to the enlarged orchestra pit.

Schuler Shook’s theatre planners brought to this fast-paced project their years of technical experience working in many other U.S. opera houses. We worked to improve both the technical systems available to the performers and artists as well as to enhance the audience’s experience from the new seating. Our scope covered stage areas and auditorium areas, the orchestra pit, new stage lighting and rigging systems, an LED-based stage titling system, and improved sightlines within a newly configured seating arrangement that allows for almost 160 additional seats.

Victory Gardens Theater, Chicago’s Tony Award®-winning home for new plays, had outgrown its space in Lincoln Park. Victory Gardens turned to Schuler Shook to lead a programming effort, identifying their goals for an expanded theatre. We worked very closely with the Artistic Director and Managing Director at that time — Dennis Zacek and Marcelle McVay — to refine Victory Gardens’s goals for a new home.

When the nearby Biograph Theatre became available for purchase, Victory Gardens saw a unique opportunity in their own neighborhood. They purchased the famed cinema and began an extensive adaptation, developing a new 299-seat theatre that offers their playwrights a larger, more capable stage.

Schuler Shook advised Victory Gardens on theatre and backstage planning, designed the stage rigging and lighting systems, and assisted during construction of the project. In addition, Robert Shook designed lighting for the opening production of Charles Smith’s Denmark.